The Monarchs were formed in 1920, primarily from Wilkinson's own multi-racial All-Nations team and from players signed from the all-Negro Twenty-Fifth Infantry Wreckers team. Their name came from an earlier semi-pro team in Kansas City that played in the decade before. That team reportedly took its name from its sponsor, the Monarch Printing Company, and was derived from the Monarch butterfly. The Monarchs' logo shown on this page was created retroactively, long after the team's demise. As most Negro leagues teams did not contemporaneously employ a real logo, the ones we see now were mostly created as marketing tools in the 1980s or 1990s.

Following the breaking of the color bar and the raiding of many Negro Leagues teams by the white majors, J.L. Wilkinson sold his interest in the club to partner Tom Baird after the 1948 season and retired. When the Kansas City A's began play in 1955, the Monarchs found themselves paying increasingly exorbitant rent and fees for use of Municipal Stadium, and Baird sold a number of players to major league organizations and released manager Buck O'Neil, who then signed as a scout for the Chicago Cubs. Baird became a scout for the Kansas City Athletics and then sold the Monarchs franchise to entrepreneur and owner of the Detroit club, Ted Rasberry, who kept the team's name but based it out of Grand Rapids, Michigan. After having sent more players to the major leagues than any other Negro League franchise, the Monarchs barnstormed after the end of the NAL, finally disbanding after the 1965 season.